Planning weddings for a living gave Lacey or With Love Lacey an unusually clear idea of what she did not want when it came time to plan her own.
Rather than embracing the pressure, timelines, and production that can surround a wedding day, the planner behind With Love Lacey intentionally stripped hers back. She and Austin gathered their closest loved ones at The Highlands Retreat, an architectural escape overlooking the Buffalo River in the Ozark Mountains, for a winter celebration photographed by A. Toler Photo and designed to feel more like a weekend at home than an event.
The result was deeply personal and beautifully restrained, with Lacey’s own hands involved in nearly every part of the experience.
Lacey spent her wedding morning arranging flowers with family
There was no rush to move through a tightly choreographed getting-ready schedule.
Instead, Lacey spent the morning alongside her family arranging the wedding flowers and styling the retreat herself. The process was not something happening behind the scenes before the “real” wedding began. It was part of the wedding.
As a planner, Lacey was accustomed to creating spaces for other couples. This time, personally arranging the florals and curating the details allowed her to shape the atmosphere of her own celebration while spending those hours with the people closest to her.
A spiral staircase became Lacey’s ceremony aisle
As sunset approached, everyone gathered in the retreat’s living room for the ceremony.
Rather than a traditional processional, Lacey descended the home’s spiral staircase before joining Austin below. Candlelight warmed the interior as mountain views stretched beyond the windows, allowing the architecture and surrounding Ozark landscape to create the setting naturally.
The intimate indoor ceremony felt particularly suited to winter. Instead of transforming the living room into a conventional ceremony space, Lacey and Austin allowed it to retain the warmth and familiarity of a home.
Candlelight and mountain views replaced elaborate ceremony decor
Restraint became one of the most defining elements of the celebration.
The mountain setting, architectural interiors, winter light, and candles provided much of the atmosphere on their own. Rather than layering on details simply because they were expected at a wedding, Lacey focused on the elements that carried personal meaning.
That approach allowed the ceremony to feel quiet and emotional, with attention remaining on the people gathered together rather than on a large production around them.
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A private chef turned dinner into part of the experience
Following the ceremony, guests stayed close and gathered around the table for an intimate dinner prepared by chef Isaac Kenneth.
There was no dramatic room reveal or major transition into a separate reception. Dinner felt like a natural continuation of the evening, with loved ones lingering together inside the retreat.
Even Lacey joined the chef in preparing dessert, further blurring the line between hosting a wedding and simply spending a meaningful evening at home with family.
They created custom wedding scents, then turned them into candles
One of Lacey and Austin’s most distinctive details could not simply be seen.
The couple custom-created a perfume and cologne specifically for their wedding. They then transformed those fragrances into candles for their guests, allowing the scents to become part of the atmosphere inside the home.
The candles burned throughout the retreat all day, filling the space with a fragrance created specifically for the couple’s celebration. Afterward, guests could take the candles with them, turning scent into both a wedding-day detail and a tangible memory of the weekend.
The wedding felt more like a weekend at home
For a bride who spends her professional life planning weddings, choosing simplicity was intentional.
Lacey and Austin did not remove meaning by removing production. Instead, they created more room for it. Arranging flowers became time with family. A custom perfume and cologne became the scent filling the home. The living room became a ceremony space at sunset. Preparing dessert became another memory made together rather than a task hidden behind the scenes.
Nothing needed to happen simply because it was expected.
By allowing the day to move slowly, Lacey and Austin created a winter wedding centered on what they actually wanted to remember: candlelight, mountain views, food prepared together, family gathered around the table, and the rare feeling of having nowhere else they needed to be.
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